Armchair Treasure Hunt 2015
| Title: | Great Circles |
| Setter: | Dave Kee |
| Themes: | FitzRoy & the Beagle |
Results, Prizes and Special Awards
There were 28 entries this year, including, two "virgin" teams where no team member has taken part in this ATH before. Two teams found the treasure, the first on December 23 and the second on January 1.
The solution is divided into 299 separate markable items. Following the traditional scoring method, the number of points awarded for a correct answer is equal to one more than the number of teams who got that answer wrong.
The marking spreadsheet lists each markable item with a reference, the references are largely self explanatory. For example "PH04.8, Station Latitude" refers to markable item number 8 on the notes page for Partial Hunt page 4. The solution documents have been annotated to include the markable items as red numbers on pdf layer "Marking References" which is visible by default but can be turned off.
A team can only win one prize, so a team that would otherwise win more than one is only awarded their best one, which explains why, for example, Alcoholus Lubricatum officially have the "Second best solution" despite having the third highest score.
Note that the trophy for best solution has been renamed, and engraved, the "Dave Harding Trophy". Sadly Dave died last year. Dave was a long time enthusiast for the ATH (as a member of the PATHfinders team) and instrumental in getting PablosATH.com off the ground. He was particularly keen that there should be a trophy for the best solution and he selected the trophy that was presented for the first time to the ATH2014 winner. Dave will be missed by ATHers and hopefully he would approve of this "in memoriam".
The best solution this year was from the Psychologicals team and they have kindly allowed its publication here.
| Team Name | Captain | Virgin | Ticket | Points | Prize* | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Psychologicals | Eagle-eye | 2 | 2986 | Best solution, Dave Harding Trophy | |
| 2 | Bruce Hindsight | Mark Wainwright | 1 | 2886 | First to treasure, Pablo Memorial Trophy | |
| 3 | Alcoholus Lubricatum | Chris Andrews | 2641 | Second best solution | ||
| 4 | Apopheniacs Anonymous | Mark Abbott | 2486 | Third best solution | ||
| 5 | Tweleve Pack | Noel Aitchison | 2433 | |||
| 6 | Lady Strange and the Earl of Yarborough | Paul Barden | 2299 | Red mist award | ||
| 7 | PATHfinders | Matthew Hulbert | 2192 | Best Team Biography | ||
| 8 | Chiltern Fellowship | Jon Wallis | 2174 | Red Herring award | ||
| 9 | Peter D G Smith et al | Tony Newman | 2129 | |||
| 10 | Team Sociometry | Adrian Rose | 1923 | |||
| 11 | Team Poirot | Anne Traynor | 1907 | |||
| 12 | The Four Horsemen of the Apocralypse | Richard Roper | 1845 | |||
| 13 | No Management Potential | Steve Hames | 1731 | |||
| 14 | Stragglers | Bart Bramley | 1715 | |||
| 15 | Simon Long & Katherine Jones | Simon Long | 1661 | |||
| 16 | Team Norway | Tim North | 1522 | |||
| 17 | Team Life On Marr's | Andy Marr | 1487 | |||
| 18 | Not Remotely Under Control | James Bunch | 1450 | |||
| 19 | Famous Five | Brian Mills | 1283 | |||
| 20 | Hartwell's Heroes | Gareth Hartwell | 1090 | |||
| 21 | Quinta Essentia | Bernhild, Frank, Roswitha, Sven, Uta | 1075 | "No native speakers" award | ||
| 22 | The Slow Learners | D Thomas | 962 | |||
| 23 | David Williams | Dave Williams | 709 | |||
| 24 | Team Quemados | Antonis Lalatsas | V | 705 | Best Virgin entry | |
| 25 | I'm Spartacus | Adam Butler | 659 | Best "rickroll" of the setters | ||
| 26 | f.ds | Mikkel Brekke | 585 | |||
| 27 | Rickrolling | Hamish Walke | V | 299 | ||
| 28 | Mind the Gap | Michael Wood | 229 | Team in need of most encouragement |
Key:
V = "ATH Virgin" - no team member has taken part in a Logica/CGI/Pablo ATH
before
Ticket = Ticket number from the treasure box
*All prize winners received a
commemorative mug.
Awards:
Red Mist - Probably best explained at the prize giving.
Red Herring - Fully swallowed the red herring location and visited it a lot!
"No native speakers" - Best entry from a team with no native speakers. To quote from their entry "... we had some slight linguistic difficulties with puns and phrases, but we consider that as a challenge (but what the hell did the cows in the corn?)"
Best "rickroll" of the setters - Several teams rickrolled the setters in their entries and emails, we fell for the enticing video on this entry without a second thought.
Team in need of most encouragement - Not just because of the wooden spoon. To quote from their entry "We have decided to answer your plea for any assistance with David's sad condition although we are concerned that our very poor performance this year may lead to a relapse on his part. In fact the whole team is considering checking into a clinic to treat our depression at how badly we've done"